It’s obvious from yesterday’s vote that embryonic stem cells will continue to split the country (California versus Washington DC, for one thing). But in an ironic bit of timing researchers at the Reproductive Genetics Institute have just published some results at Reproductive BioMedicine Online that could–possibly–short-circuit some of the arguments against using embryonic stem cells.
Scientific American, October 31, 2004
By page 77 of The God Gene, Dean H. Hamer has already disowned the title of his own book. He recalls describing to a colleague his discovery of a link between spirituality and a specific gene he calls “the God gene.” His colleague raised her eyebrows. “Do you mean there’s just one?” she asked.
“I deserved her skepticism,” Hamer writes. “What I meant to say, of course, was ‘a’ God gene, not ‘the’ God gene.”
Of course. Why, the reader wonders, didn’t Hamer call his book A God Gene? That might not have been as catchy, but at least it wouldn’t have left him contradicting himself.
The good folks at Corante are rejiggering the design of their blogs, The Loom included. Some stuff has yet to make the transition as of this writing, but before too long it will all be back in place.
Get to know that little skull. Scientists are going to be talking about it for centuries.
I’ve written a piece for Newsweek about how to program a cell. (The Newsweek International edition comes out this week; the US edition comes out next week.) I find the ongoing research exciting, but sometimes I wonder how much of its promise will become real. Programmable cells, for example, are an illustration of the exciting frontiers that can be explored with stem cells. It may be possible to wire the genetic circuits of a stem cell to make it grow into a particular sort of organ, produce a certain sort of hormone, etc. But it’s hard to see how any of that will come to pass if stem cell research withers on the vine. And when I look elsewhere in this week’s issue of Newsweek and see how we can’t even handle flu vaccines, my hope for medical progress in general starts to dim.